Desdemona, I would be soooooooooo tempted to write "Yeah, why rely on perfectly legitamate government assistance programs when you can freeload off of your family members?"

I'll admit it was a temptation I found tough to resist. It's the hypocrisy that sends me into orbit: if you've fallen on hard times and need some help, fair enough, but show some friggin' compassion. It's pretty two-faced to throw shame on hypothetical strangers whose circumstances you can know nothing about when you're actually engaging in exactly the behavior you're criticizing.

"my problems are with the woman in front of me at the market w 5 t bones and paying with the ebt card coming out of her Gucci purse . I'm shopping for managers special meats and working 75 hours a week. Get off your soap box, it should peas you off too. Even better, offering to pay with their snap card, and you can just give them the cash. I have no problem with folks getting the help they need. People need public assistance sometimes, that's why it's available. I have problems with people taking advantage of it and rubbing it in my face.

This "welfare queen with the designer purse buying steaks (or lobsters or crab legs or whatever" trope is so. goddamn. tired. I mean, has anyone ever actually seen this phenomenon? Better yet, this mythical personage is apparently buying steaks for the specific purpose of rubbing his (hardworking, cheap-meat-eating) face in it. And even better yet, two of my nieces (both of who are his FB friends) were partially raised on public assistance after their father died and their mom could pay rent and buy food while going to school so she could get a job (which she did). Like a fool, this is how I responded.

Desdemonawhoshouldreallyknowbetterthantoeventry wrote:

But it's not that simple - of course there are always people who will game any system. But they aren't the majority, and everyone in need can't be punished because a few are corrupt. Please read the second link (from HuffPo) for a more balanced picture. No one can tell another person's story (much less their ethics or values) by looking at them, and why care what a complete stranger chooses to spend their (extremely limited) food dollars on? In what universe is that the business of some random person in the checkout? That woman might have a particular reason for buying steaks; maybe it's a special occasion; maybe she'll cut corners elsewhere; maybe she's exploiting the system. But no matter how you slice it, it's nobody else's business what she spends funds from a perfectly legitimate public program which she is A. qualified for, and B. doesn't actually pay all that well. Most public assistance programs (or their prototypes) were put into place by FDR - your working class grandfather's favorite president, BTW - because the American way is supposed to be to HELP people, not punish them for being poor. (You might also think about people we know and love who have had to rely on public assistance at various times, and how posts like this might make them feel.)

Maybe you could just throw out a tiny little pointed "I mean, have you really never spent money on something that could have better spent paying off debts/savings/investments?"

Because really that's what aggravates me most about people complaining about what people spend their government assistance money. We're all guilty of buying something for momentary pleasure when we could spend more wisely. And if you've never ever ever done that, maybe you're not living life, man! I don't care if that lady uses her food stamps to buy 5 t-bones. Maybe that will feed everyone in her family for a week and they've lived off spaghettios for two months to be able to afford that.

Ooooh Des, you are so good! I totally would've thrown in a jab like what Fee said above. My blood is boiling on your behalf.

_________________Did you notice the slight feeling of panic at the words "Chicken Basin Street"? Like someone was walking over your grave? Try not to remember. We must never remember. - mumblesIs this about devilberries and nazifruit again? - footface

Maybe you could just throw out a tiny little pointed "I mean, have you really never spent money on something that could have better spent paying off debts/savings/investments?"

Because really that's what aggravates me most about people complaining about what people spend their government assistance money. We're all guilty of buying something for momentary pleasure when we could spend more wisely. And if you've never ever ever done that, maybe you're not living life, man! I don't care if that lady uses her food stamps to buy 5 t-bones. Maybe that will feed everyone in her family for a week and they've lived off spaghettios for two months to be able to afford that.

Life is throwing me some major shiitake right now. I am experiencing a relapse in panic disorder - meaning I'm in constant overarousal-with-fear mode, head feels full of cotton wool, mind racing with catastrophe after catastrophe, I can barely eat, have horrible stomach problems, feel a tightness in my chest, tingling limbs, and generally feel like my life is over/I'm losing control/gonna die. I don't deal with change well AT ALL, and this whole contract-not-being-renewed thing is forking up the routines that I require majorly. I just want things to be okay. I have been the main breadwinner with my job, because despite being crazy educated, Trevor can't find anything that pays more than minimum wage, and now...I just don't know.

_________________Did you notice the slight feeling of panic at the words "Chicken Basin Street"? Like someone was walking over your grave? Try not to remember. We must never remember. - mumblesIs this about devilberries and nazifruit again? - footface

I feel bad for anybody paying for groceries with a snap card because it seems like the whole world is standing around judging whether or not they deserve the items in their cart. That's forked up.

It's also possible to have nice things and be in hard times. I'm not sure why people love to forget that. Maybe because they don't want to think it could happen to them? I guess they should pass out appropriate rags from the goodwill reject pile with snap cards. Gucci bag that peas him off so much is probably a$25 knock off anyway since probably 90% are.

_________________"This is the creepiest post ever if you don't know who Molly is." -Fee"a vegan death match sounds like something where we all end up hugging." -LisaPunk

I feel bad for anybody paying for groceries with a snap card because it seems like the whole world is standing around judging whether or not they deserve the items in their cart. That's forked up.

It really, really is. Talk about living in a police state; as if it's not enough fun to be having financial difficulties, you also get to deal with random nosy-ass people judging and sneering (sometimes audibly) as they critique what you should be allowed to eat.

lavawitch wrote:

It's also possible to have nice things and be in hard times. I'm not sure why people love to forget that. Maybe because they don't want to think it could happen to them? I guess they should pass out appropriate rags from the goodwill reject pile with snap cards. Gucci bag that peas him off so much is probably a$25 knock off anyway since probably 90% are.

Yeah, I thought the same thing but didn't bother to point that out since he probably made the whole thing up anyway. Witness his blistering rebuttal:

resentfuluninformedignoramus wrote:

It is that simple, sorry. Watching what I'm spending while seeing what others blow on their Snap card. I witnessed a woman arguing about Snap not covering the most expensive items in her cart. It's bullshiitake and their sense of entitlement makes me want to {{{SCREAM}}}. I wouldn't wish hunger on anyone. The folks I speak of are stealing and or cheating the system. Spending $300 on your ebt card and piling 4 kids into a late model Suburban parked in the fire lane while posting pics of your overdressed kids on instagram with your brand new Iphone 5 make me want to slash tires. I don't care if it makes me "ugly" either.

DopeyDesdemona wrote:

Wow, that's an awful lot of highly detailed personal information from a momentary, chance encounter. Maybe you should have been a detective! Again: read that HuffPo article for a little more perspective.

And then I went to the grocery store so I could invent elaborate, judgmental narratives about complete strangers by minutely examining the contents of their shopping carts. I mean, these poor people with their poverty and their wanting - no, feeling entitled - to eat. It makes me want to {{{SCREAM}}}, you know???

I have lost my day planner and it is wreaking havoc in my life. Today I was 90 minutes late to work because I went to two appointments that aren't until tomorrow. At least the good news now is that I didn't oversleep and miss Molly's vet appointment?

I feel bad for anybody paying for groceries with a snap card because it seems like the whole world is standing around judging whether or not they deserve the items in their cart. That's forked up.

It really, really is. Talk about living in a police state; as if it's not enough fun to be having financial difficulties, you also get to deal with random nosy-ass people judging and sneering (sometimes audibly) as they critique what you should be allowed to eat.

lavawitch wrote:

It's also possible to have nice things and be in hard times. I'm not sure why people love to forget that. Maybe because they don't want to think it could happen to them? I guess they should pass out appropriate rags from the goodwill reject pile with snap cards. Gucci bag that peas him off so much is probably a$25 knock off anyway since probably 90% are.

Yeah, I thought the same thing but didn't bother to point that out since he probably made the whole thing up anyway. Witness his blistering rebuttal:

resentfuluninformedignoramus wrote:

It is that simple, sorry. Watching what I'm spending while seeing what others blow on their Snap card. I witnessed a woman arguing about Snap not covering the most expensive items in her cart. It's bullshiitake and their sense of entitlement makes me want to {{{SCREAM}}}. I wouldn't wish hunger on anyone. The folks I speak of are stealing and or cheating the system. Spending $300 on your ebt card and piling 4 kids into a late model Suburban parked in the fire lane while posting pics of your overdressed kids on instagram with your brand new Iphone 5 make me want to slash tires. I don't care if it makes me "ugly" either.

DopeyDesdemona wrote:

Wow, that's an awful lot of highly detailed personal information from a momentary, chance encounter. Maybe you should have been a detective! Again: read that HuffPo article for a little more perspective.

And then I went to the grocery store so I could invent elaborate, judgmental narratives about complete strangers by minutely examining the contents of their shopping carts. I mean, these poor people with their poverty and their wanting - no, feeling entitled - to eat. It makes me want to {{{SCREAM}}}, you know???

Maybe he should be getting a second job to pay you back with all his free time that is apparently now spent stalking people on EBT.

I see some of that same attitude regarding a recent transit worker strike here in the Bay Area. It's like, in their mind, if you want to get food assistance or the right to go on strike, you have to be living in abject misery in order to be 'deserving' of it. I think it's this specifically American mindset that if you are given assistance, it has to be so minimal that you're motivated to improve your lot in life and get off the benefits so you can afford those steaks yourself. Which is, of course, blindingly ignorant of how poverty really works, not to mention just inhumane to dictate that someone must be thoroughly and obviously deprived in order to 'deserve' any type of social safety net.

And I also want to join the chorus that you were unbelievably diplomatic in refraining from mentioning the $1,000 debt he owes you. Had it been me, my FB page would look like the aftermath of a Viking raid by now. Pillars of smoke just billowing up from the computer monitor.

I see some of that same attitude regarding a recent transit worker strike here in the Bay Area. It's like, in their mind, if you want to get food assistance or the right to go on strike, you have to be living in abject misery in order to be 'deserving' of it. I think it's thisspecifically American mindset that if you are given assistance, it has to be so minimal that you're motivated to improve your lot in life and get off the benefits so you can afford those steaks yourself. Which is, of course, blindingly ignorant of how poverty really works, not to mention just inhumane to dictate that someone must be thoroughly and obviously deprived in order to 'deserve' any type of social safety net.

The same ignorant bullshiitake is prevalent here. I think it's safe to say it is not just confined to America.

_________________Everyone turns into Boo Radley, if they live long enough ~ seitanicversesThere are as many ways to live as there are humans in the world ~ SchwaGrrrl

I see some of that same attitude regarding a recent transit worker strike here in the Bay Area. It's like, in their mind, if you want to get food assistance or the right to go on strike, you have to be living in abject misery in order to be 'deserving' of it. I think it's this specifically American mindset that if you are given assistance, it has to be so minimal that you're motivated to improve your lot in life and get off the benefits so you can afford those steaks yourself. Which is, of course, blindingly ignorant of how poverty really works, not to mention just inhumane to dictate that someone must be thoroughly and obviously deprived in order to 'deserve' any type of social safety net.

It's such a bleak, unkind, punitive attitude; it makes me sad to know people who feel that poverty is insufficient "punishment" for...itself, you know??

Erika Soyf*cker wrote:

And I also want to join the chorus that you were unbelievably diplomatic in refraining from mentioning the $1,000 debt he owes you. Had it been me, my FB page would look like the aftermath of a Viking raid by now. Pillars of smoke just billowing up from the computer monitor.

This is a pleasing image. And then we could hoist a few in Virtual Vegan Valhalla!!!

I was given an old wrist watch as a late 21st birthday present from my boyfriends step father. It was dated to being made back in 1910, it really is a beautiful thing. Today the little bit which you need to twist to wind it up had fallen off whilst I was out today. I'm gutted.

I was given an old wrist watch as a late 21st birthday present from my boyfriends step father. It was dated to being made back in 1910, it really is a beautiful thing. Today the little bit which you need to twist to wind it up had fallen off whilst I was out today. I'm gutted.

Take it to a decent jeweler's STAT; I'm sure they can sort you out, or send you to the person who can. (This reminds me of the part in Black Swan Green when the teenaged protagonist shatters the watch his grandfather had brought back from WWII; your situation sounds much more fixable!)

I've been thinking and I can't even recall ever seeing anybody pay with a snap card, ever. Then I realized that its because I've never watched ANYBODY pay for their groceries before. How is this even a thing that people do? There are tabloid headlines to be read! How else will be know when Kate's two-headed alien baby will be born in a special oxygen chamber underneath a newly discovered Mayan tomb that may or may not hold the key to Atlantis and the fountain of youth?

_________________"This is the creepiest post ever if you don't know who Molly is." -Fee"a vegan death match sounds like something where we all end up hugging." -LisaPunk

My car had a very very bad tie rod. And I was wheeling around like nothing was wrong. But the money spent on that was supposed to go straight to my business. It is a small grievance. But it begins to feel as though all I do is shift money away from the business.